FIGHTING THE GOOD FIGHT

Posted April 20, 2024

As the end of the year approaches, I wish a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of our Brothers and Sisters. It has been an honor to serve our membership alongside a great team of labor leaders at DC 35, under BM/ST Chris Brennan’s leadership, to protect our jurisdiction, increase our market share, and generate work hours for our members.

Wage theft is a plague that has been hurting workers in our industries for years, and we are fully committed to educating and assisting potential victims that we meet. Since April of last year, we have been in contact with the workers of Idea Painting Company, a Medfield-based residential and commercial painting contractor. In a team effort, we assisted the workers in filing a wage theft complaint with the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Fair Labor Division, and the company was issued a series of citations totaling $511,045.50 in restitution and civil penalties.

Actions like these will bring justice back to the workers and discourage employers from engaging in wage theft practices, contributing to a more equitable job market.

DC 35’s Organizing and Servicing Departments have initiated a job action in the City of Everett against the second most prominent residential developer in the United States. These actions would not be possible without the help of rank and file members and retirees. Greystar Real Estate Partners have ignored area community standards, and we are informing the community about their unsafe practices in other parts of the country through leaflets and banners at their latest construction project on Revere Beach Parkway in Everett.

DC 35 will stay active while these multi-billion-dollar companies attempt to break into our communities and lower the standards of safety, quality, and wages in the Painting, Drywall Finishing, and Glazing industries.

We all heard that Somerville would be “the new Cambridge” regarding the amount of ongoing and future construction projects. Unfortunately this historically did not benefit manyUnion workers, especially the members of DC 35, since city administrators did not seem to care about safety, quality, and community standards..

But over the past few years, now-BM/ST Chris Brennan has built relationships as DC 35 Business Representative in DC 35’s jurisdiction that have enabled our members to be seen as the deeply-engrained in this community.Thanks to this hard work, there are three upcoming projects in Somerville, with a commitment of being built 100% Union:

Brickyard at Assembly (120 Middlesex Ave):

18-story Building; 596.000 SF of lab space.
Gateway Innovation Center (200 McGrath Highway):
2 Buildings (16-story each); 980.000 SF of space.

Boynton Yards (1 Earle St):

3rd Building out of 6 being built.

The same applies to two upcoming projects in Charlestown and Everett, a commitment of being built 100% Union:

One Mystic Avenue, Charlestown: 22-story mixed-use tower
380 Second St, Everett: 21-story tower.

Finally, we started conversations with the city of Salem, Crowley Maritime, and potential tenants for the construction of the site that will act as a marshaling port to support the Offshore Wind construction off the coast of Salem, MA. Alongside Frank Callahan, President of Massachusetts Building Trades Council, we are in the beginning stages of drafting a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) that will make sure the project will be completed safely, on time, and on budget by a highly-skilled and highly-trained workforce, including DC 35’s Painters, Drywall Finishers, and Glaziers.

In all we do, always Remember the Members.